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CRM · head to head

Apollo.io vs Common Room

Apollo.io logo

Apollo.io

CRM

Revenue intelligence platform

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Common Room logo

Common Room

Sales Enablement

Customer and community intelligence that stitches scattered person identities into one go-to-market signal feed

From
$2500/month
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Apollo.io has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Apollo.io everything is metered in credits, and the free Starter plan runs on them too, so prospecting volume is capped rather than the feature set; Common Room the entry plan is 2,500 US dollars a month billed annually, a floor of 30,000 a year, which excludes exactly the early-stage community-led companies whose signal is strongest.
  • They diverge on capability: Apollo.io covers Contact database, Common Room covers Person360 identity resolution.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Apollo.io and Common Room actually diverge.

Attributes where Apollo.io and Common Room differ
AttributeApollo.ioCommon Room
Starting priceFree$2500/month
Pricing modelsubscriptionPer month by contact volume
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsWebWeb, Chrome extension
CategoryCRMSales Enablement
Founded2020Unknown

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Apollo.io

  • Contact database
  • Email finder
  • Lead search
  • Automation
  • Engagement tracking
  • Reporting
  • Salesforce
  • HubSpot

Only in Common Room

  • Person360 identity resolution
  • Community source ingestion
  • Signal alerts
  • Account and contact scoring
  • Website deanonymisation
  • RoomieAI research
  • Prospector
  • Intent data

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Apollo.io

  • Sales prospecting and lead generationnot Common Room
  • Contact database management for sales teamsnot Common Room
  • Email outreach and workflow automationnot Common Room

Common Room

  • A developer tools company whose GitHub stars and Slack community contain buyers nobody has ever contacted because the handles do not match any CRM recordnot Apollo.io
  • A sales team that wants to be alerted when a former champion changes job to a target account, with the previous relationship attachednot Apollo.io
  • A marketing function trying to prove that community participation precedes pipeline, which requires joining community identity to opportunity datanot Apollo.io
  • A product-led business wanting to route free users who match the enterprise buyer profile to sellers based on both product usage and public activitynot Apollo.io

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Apollo.io

  • Everything is metered in credits, and the free Starter plan runs on them too, so prospecting volume is capped rather than the feature set
  • Plans described as unlimited are capped in the fair use policy at 10,000 credits a month for non-paying accounts
  • Connecting a mailbox that is not Gmail or Microsoft requires a paid plan
  • How many records can be selected at once varies by tier
  • Running out of credits means buying more rather than waiting for a reset

Common Room

  • The entry plan is 2,500 US dollars a month billed annually, a floor of 30,000 a year, which excludes exactly the early-stage community-led companies whose signal is strongest.
  • RoomieAI and Prospector run on credit allocations rather than unlimited use, so heavy research months exhaust the budget and the workflow stops until the next cycle or an upgrade.
  • Contact ceilings of 100,000 on Essential are consumed quickly by any sizeable public community, and the overage conversation is an upgrade to a quoted tier rather than an incremental charge.
  • Identity resolution is probabilistic, so wrong merges happen, and a seller who contacts the wrong person with context from someone else does more damage than no alert at all.
  • Signal volume overwhelms teams without a defined qualification rule; most implementations that fail do so because everything became an alert and sellers stopped reading them within a month.

Pricing, plan by plan

Apollo.io

Free
  • FreeFree
    • Basic contact search
    • Limited searches
  • Starter$49/month
    • Everything in Free
    • Advanced search
    • Email finder
  • Professional$149/month
    • Everything in Starter
    • Automation
    • Advanced analytics

Common Room

$2500/month
  • Essential$2500/month
    • 5 seats
    • 100,000 contacts
    • Person360 enrichment and identity resolution
  • Advanced$undefined/year
    • 15 seats
    • 250,000 contacts
    • RoomieAI research, 7,500 credits
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • 30 seats
    • 750,000 contacts
    • RoomieAI research, 10,000 credits

Which should you pick?

Choose Apollo.io if

  • You need contact database.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You also want email finder.
Apollo.io review

Choose Common Room if

  • You need person360 identity resolution.
  • You work on Web, Chrome extension.
  • You also want community source ingestion.
Common Room review

Questions people ask

Is Apollo.io or Common Room better?
Neither clearly leads. Apollo.io starts at Free and Common Room at $2500/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Apollo.io or Common Room?
Apollo.io has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Apollo.io and $2500/month for Common Room.
Does Apollo.io or Common Room run on more platforms?
Apollo.io runs on Web. Common Room runs on Web, Chrome extension.
Can I use Apollo.io for free?
Yes. Apollo.io has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Common Room starts at $2500/month.
What is Apollo.io best used for?
Apollo.io is most often used for sales prospecting and lead generation, contact database management for sales teams, email outreach and workflow automation. Of those, sales prospecting and lead generation and contact database management for sales teams are not what Common Room is typically brought in for.
What can Apollo.io do that Common Room cannot?
Apollo.io covers Contact database, Email finder, Lead search, Automation. Common Room covers Person360 identity resolution, Community source ingestion, Signal alerts, Account and contact scoring.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Apollo.io: Does Apollo offer a free plan?

Yes, Apollo offers a Starter plan that is free forever and includes unlimited email addresses for contacts. Gmail and Microsoft email account linking are available on the free plan with limited third-party email account linking.

Source
Common Room: What does the entry plan actually cost?

2,500 US dollars per month billed annually, for 5 seats and 100,000 contacts. Higher tiers are quoted.

Apollo.io: How does Apollo's credit system work?

Apollo uses a credit-based system for exporting contact data outside the platform. Free and non-paying accounts have a monthly credit limit of 10,000 credits. Paid accounts receive limits based on their plan pricing, calculated as the lesser of annual commit divided by $0.025 or 1 million credits annually.

Source
Common Room: Is this only for developer tools companies?

It is strongest where there is a public community to observe. Companies with no community signal get a narrower version of the product and should compare it against ordinary intent data vendors.

Apollo.io: How much do trial plans cost on Apollo?

Apollo trial plans include 50 credits and 5 mobile credits to test paid features at no charge. Trial versions do not support non-Gmail/Microsoft email account linking. Upgrades take effect immediately while downgrades take effect at the end of the billing cycle.

Source
Common Room: Does it replace ZoomInfo?

No. It is signal and identity resolution rather than a contact database, though Prospector covers some contact discovery within accounts.

Common Room: How are AI features metered?

By credits per tier, from 5,000 RoomieAI credits on Essential up to 10,000 on Enterprise, with Prospector credits counted separately.

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Related pages

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